Bats/Transcript
Transcript Text reads: The Mysteries of Life with Tim and Moby Tim is in a tropical forest when he sees a cave. TIM: Hey; Moby, are you in there? Tim yells into the cave and his voice echoes. MOBY: Beep. Moby beeps and his sound echoes as well. TIM: What? Dozens of bats fly out of the cave all at once. Tim covers his face and ducks down. TIM: Gaaah! MOBY: Beep. TIM: Did you see them? Well, how, how big were they? Moby points into the cave. Tim reads from a typed letter. TIM: Dear Tim and Moby, I want to know everything about bats. Tell me. From, Aurelie. Well, huh, that's, that's gonna be...Oh, okay, okay. For starters, bats are not birds. They are the only flying mammals on Earth. An animation shows a bat, four birds grouped together, and a cat, dog, sheep, bear, and mouse grouped together. The bat flies from the group of birds to the other group of animals. MOBY: Beep. TIM: That's right. Up close, they're furry, with leathery wings, instead of feathered ones. There are more than one thousand species of bats on Earth. And you can find them on every continent except Antarctica. An animation shows a bat flying. TIM: The largest bat in the world is the fruit-eating flying fox with a wingspan of one hundred and thirty centimeters, or about five feet. An image shows a large fruit-eating flying fox bat. TIM: The smallest bat in the world is the bumblebee bat. These guys are only three to four centimeters long, with a wingspan of about eighteen centimeters. An image shows a small bumblebee bat hanging by its feet from a tree branch. TIM: Bats live in crevices, caves, trees, maybe even your attic! MOBY: Beep. TIM: Well, bats eat all kinds of things. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Well, most of them eat insects, but like that big guy we just mentioned, some eat fruit. There are also nectar-eating bats; meat-eating bats that like small mammals, birds, lizards, frogs, and other bats; uh, fish-eating bats; and the famous vampire bats that eat blood. An image shows a flower, a drop of blood, and the animals Tim mentions. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yup, it's true. But they don't exactly suck blood. Vampire bats puncture the skin of an animal, usually a cow or some kind of livestock, and lap up its blood until they're full. An animation shows a cow grazing. A bat attaches itself to the cow’s back. TIM: Bats are divided into two groups by the way that they hunt. The Microchiropterans, like the vampire bat and the insect-hunting bats, hunt for food at night using echolocation. These guys send out high-pitched sounds that bounce off other objects. By receiving the bounced sound, the bat can determine where those objects are located. An image shows a bat flying in the dark and sending out sound waves. Circles representing sound waves bounce off some rocks and tell the bat where the rocks are located. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yeah, it's a lot like the way that submarines use sonar. Megachiropterans, like the fruit bat, use a well-developed sense of smell, and big eyes, to find their food. Since they rely on their sense of sight, some of these guys eat during the daylight hours, and spend their nights sleeping in trees. A bat hangs upside down when it sleeps. An animation shows a fruit bat in a tree eating the fruit. An image shows a fruit bat asleep, hanging upside down from a tree branch. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yeah, their bodies have evolved to hang upside down. Like all mammals, bats give birth to live "bat-pups," and feed them with milk from their bodies. But bats are slow about reproducing. Females only give birth to one bat baby at a time, and that happens about once a year. An image shows a mother and her baby bat. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Well, relative to their size, that's not a lot. The majority of bats are pretty small. And since some species of bats are listed as endangered, low birth rate can be a real problem. An image shows a line of sleeping bats hanging upside down. There is one large bat, four smaller ones, and a tiny one. TIM: So, I don't know about going back in there. Tim, standing in front of the cave, looks at Moby. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Seriously, I think I heard something back there. Moby takes Tim's hand and walks into the cave. Tim walks in backwards. TIM: What about the giant, six-foot, fruit-eating, fox-man-bat-vampire-bat thing? Tim's voice echoes. TIM: I'm serious. This is the tropics. This is where they live. The scene fades to black. Category:BrainPOP Transcripts Category:BrainPOP Science Transcripts